


Prom Night

by GlassGeorgeGlass



Series: Making Right What Once Went Wrong [5]
Category: Heathers (1988), Heathers: The Musical - Murphy & O'Keefe
Genre: And its their first time trying with them, As well as OTP, But kinda on character, F/M, Handcuffs, I can't help it, I mean, I want to maintain at least weekly posts, I write what pops into my head, Light Bondage, Lingerie, Oh, Oral Sex, Post the epilogue!, Prom Night, Sexyness, Stop writing these extra bits, Talk about past girlfriends, Than Chapter 2 and 3 Get Serious, Veronica and JD are MFEO, both ways, erm, having fun, kinda sad, that's a thing that happens, they're 18
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-25 18:08:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30093057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlassGeorgeGlass/pseuds/GlassGeorgeGlass
Summary: JD and Veronica return to his place on prom night to have a little post-prom sexy fun time. Turns out something fun was on underneath her pretty blue prom dress and she's got some handcuffs and wants to try them out. She's reminded of their first encounter and her own virginity losing.Afterwards Veronica asks him to tell her about what his first time was like. JD tells her the tale of his two ex-girlfriends.A bit of a fun sexy cut scene from Chapter 29 of the main story with a serious conversation after.
Relationships: Jason "J. D." Dean/Veronica Sawyer
Series: Making Right What Once Went Wrong [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1823566
Comments: 15
Kudos: 24





	1. Youwouldn'tmindifIcuffedyoutothebedframe?

**Author's Note:**

> So, I know. Stop posting sequels and extras! Epilogue!
> 
> But! I promised prom night handcuff sexy and I deliver. I put the E rating on it because even though there's sexual content in the regular story this is REALLY sexy and I'd rather be safe than sorry. That being said ALL SEX IS CONSENSUAL.
> 
> I also deliver story time from JD. I really didn't mean to but the story of JD and his first time with a girl just flew out of the keyboard. I really liked it. That being said, rest assured in this story Veronica is the light of his life and his one true love. But she wants him to be open and honest with her. I hope people like this. It relates to a lot of how their own relationship plays out which is what I also really wanted. To fill in some gaps for that and how his past experiences shaped how their relationship was approached.
> 
> I believe a commenter asked me once (I apologize, I will find your name and comment and shout it out) about JD's "type" and was curious over his two past girlfriends he admits having had to Veronica and this tumbled out. Thank you for that comment.

JD was already kissing Veronica as he pressed her up against the door to his basement. He fumbled behind her to unlock the door without breaking contact. “Hmmm,” she moaned as he kissed her and they broke apart as he moved down her sweet soft neck to delicately attack it the way she liked. She was still buzzed from the small bottle of liquor they had consumed and he remembered from experience that Veronica and slightly buzzed was a formula for a frisky in the sack Veronica and eagerly anticipated the night. She also had a tendency to take charge, which he also really liked. “Open the door already so I can get you out of your fancy clothes,” she teased him tugging on his jacket, and sliding her hands under his untucked shirt feeling his warm body underneath. “I fully expect you to let me have my way with you prom night.”

“You’re so shallow," he breathed into her skin. "All you want from me is my hot bod to ravage,” he teased back as his lips and teeth played with the delicate skin on her neck. “God, you must think I’m easy putting out on prom night like this.” She sighed in response and he broke apart from her against his better judgement so he could open the door.

"You're reputation will be in tatters by the time I'm through with you," she promised with a quick wink.

"I'm holding you to that." He walked over and turned his lamp on near his bed holding her hand to pull her inside. She kicked his door closed behind him and he pulled her back into his arms to thoroughly kiss her.

“Hm. Jokes aside," she mumbled, becoming warm and pliable. "I had an amazing time tonight, thank you,” she told him as he moved from her mouth across her jaw and up to her ear to nibble lightly on. She mewled pleasantly as his hands made their way to the zipper on the back of her dress.

“Good, I had a great night too,” he told her, much to his surprise. In the end, prom is what you make of it. If you want it to be fun with little drama and no overspending than it was that. And in fancy clothes. And she had to agree, seeing him in a coat and a tie with his hair neatly combed was a treat she’d savor for a long time. She got a couple of nice pictures of him like that too. Proof that Mr. Jason Dean cleaned up really well.

He reached behind her and unzipped the pretty blue dress she was in. She broke from him suddenly. “Wait,” she told him, breathlessly. 

“What’s wrong?” He asked, desperate for her but never pushy.

“Nothing. I, um- I just want to make sure my dress is hung up nicely,” she told him as he was on the verge of just letting it fall to the floor. With a groan of playful frustration he closed his eyes and pulled away and fell down on the edge of his bed and watched her go into his bathroom to hang it up on the shower rod— the only place one could in the tiny basement— without it getting wrinkled. She smirked at how small it was. They had tried to have sexy shower sex the other week when she stayed over only to realize in real life the stall was way too small in his half bath and when they used the hot water up they heard banging on the pipes from upstairs over having done it. She hoped one day they'd stay somewhere where they could try it for real. “I was thinking, we have to get you one of those portable racks,” she told him. “So you can hang up your clothes and stuff.” He laughed as he unbuttoned the cuffs on his black shirt and began to undo the main ones. 

“What clothes of mine do you think need to be properly hung up?” He asked, generally confused and curious. She considered his wardrobe of black pants, jeans, old shirts, and flannels. That suit jacket and button down he was wearing— and one “good” sweater— were about the only “nice clothes” he owned and considering how he tossed the jacket haphazardly on the floor with his other pile of dirty laundry she hardly thought “keeping it nice” was high on his priority list.

“True, but what about mine?” She carefully took out the travel hanger from her bag her mother gave her for this and hung it up. She took the corsage JD had given her and set it to the side. It was dumb and lame and cheesy but she wanted to press it and put it in a memory box of sorts— though she’d die if anyone found out she was corny enough to do that— and wanted to make sure it was safe. After all, it was the first time he’d ever brought her a flower. Well, in truth it was the first flower any boy had ever given her, and she wanted to savor that. Her bracelet, pearls and earrings were also quickly removed and put away in the jewelry box in her overnight bag so that she wouldn’t worry about losing them. 

“Veronica! Hurry up!” He jokingly barked. “I’m horny and I want to make endless love to you!” She burst into laughter as she reached for the brush she was keeping at his place now and carefully tugged it through her hair. 

“It is not gonna kill you to wait a few minutes for me to get ready for bed first! Jeez!” She quipped back. She heard his chuckle than groan. "Lay back and think about baseball! That's what guys do, right?" He laughed.

"Mookie Wilson, left field. Roger McDowell, Pitcher. Lenny Dykstra.."

She laughed, overhearing. "What's that?"

"You said think of baseball. It's the opening line up of the '86 miracle Mets." She laughed and finished seeing to her hair as he continued. It had long lost the carefully curled styling she had left the house in that evening but it was fine. With a few tugs it now clung loosely over her shoulders in a light wave, a little stiff from the mousse and hairspray but nice. She grabbed one of the baby wipes she also was now keeping in his bathroom and cleaned what was left of the makeup off her face. It gave her an odd feeling of rightness to see her toiletries in his home mingled with his own brush and toothbrush. She glanced over to see a bottle of her shampoo sitting on the ledge of the shower stall holder with his own as if they were in an intimate relationship all of their own and smiled to herself. She briefly wondered if this would be what it would be like when— _if_ she amended not wanting to push it even in her own mind— they began living together. She didn’t dwell on it though, worried unpacking those feelings with him would maybe overwhelm prom night. Instead, she glanced at her own reflection of herself in just her undergarments approvingly. She swallowed whatever self-consciousness or worry she had had about wearing these undergarments tonight and pushed passed it.

_I bought this and wore this to make a night special and dammit, I will use them to make this night special._

JD for his part kicked his boots and socks off and stretched his long and tired limbs in just his undershirt and pants awaiting her return. "...Tim Teufal, second base..." He ran his fingers in his once tidy and now messy hair and down his tired still buzzed face waiting for her to slip into his arms and let him have his way with her before they both passed out pleasantly numb.

It had been a good night and that would be the best capper. She’d stayed over a handful of times since the first one on her birthday and it amazed him how much better he slept with her curled up next to him. Even with the minor annoyances like her hair itching his nose, or when her weight made his arm fall asleep her warm body pressed against his was more comforting than anything he’d ever felt in his life. He blinked and yawned before realizing Veronica was standing in front of him. "...and Kevin Mitchel left-"

“Holy crap,” he breathed forgetting all about the Mets as he saw her and realized that she had had that on underneath her prom dress the entire night. He didn’t think that she’d be wearing anything other than her normal underclothes that night. She smiled at his dumbfounded expression. It was what she had been hoping for.

"I take it you like it." She was eating up the dumbstruck look of awe on his face.

"I mean, of course. But… are you okay wearing it?” It was the blue corset with bows that had featured so prominently in those humiliating photos. He didn’t think she’d want to be reminded of the whole awful night and aftermath but she was determined not to let that stain her experience on this night.

“I bought this for me to wear for you. It was supposed to be for just us. To seduce you,” she snorted, laughing at it but knowing she could. She climbed onto his bed straddling his lap as he crawled back resting on the palms of his hands, his face stunned. She bit her bottom lip nervously and brushed the hair out of her eyes. “I want this to be for just us.” He stared at her with the kind of want she had hoped for and her nerves started to fall away. She realized he was looking at her with the same wide eyed wonder and lust he had had on his face their first time together when she had busted into his room demanding his body. It nearly took her breath away remembering that amazing night and how it had started and how she had changed that morning after. He leaned back against his bed finally, his head on the pillow as his warm hands caressed her bare thighs— her stockings discarded with her dress— inching up to the ribbons that held together her undergarments. “Wait,” she told him. “Let me get you first.”

With a smile she undid his pants and started to tug them down his body taking his shorts down with them. “Where did you find these anyway?” She asked as he sat up and peeled his undershirt to toss it with his other clothes. “It’s so weird for me to picture you shopping for clothes for some reason.” She snorted as an image of him in his long coat poking through racks holding up different shirts to figure out which one looked better on him.  
  
“You really want to hear about me shopping right now?” He asked, his eyes transfixed on her body and his own lower body starting to instinctively arise to the occasion. “Right now? When I am sitting here desperate for you?” She swallowed overwhelmed by the honesty and leaned in and kissed him as his arms went around her and their bodies pressed against each other. “I want you,” he breathed as his mouth went from her lips to her neck to the swell of her exposed breasts. Veronica sighed in response, the warm flow of her own arousal coursing through her blood and straight down to between her legs. They had had some cheap liquor earlier, but now they were both drunk on each other.

“Unlace the bottom part,” she practically begged him. “I can’t wait,” she whispered into his neck then kissed his way up to his ear. “I’m so ready,” she whispered, taking his hand between their bodies and leading it under the silk and showing him exactly how much she wanted him. He swallowed, understanding what she wanted and desperate to give it to her and did as she commanded. Carefully he pulled away and began to tug at the ribbon holding her panties up and peeled them away from her tossing them on the floor. 

Instinctively, he went to reach for the laces holding the bodice together and stared perplexed at it. “How do you get this off?” He asked, his lust mildly allayed as he went cross eyed at all the hooks holding the corset in place. Still breathing hard as her own arousal was making her thoughts cloudy and her emotions run high she brushed his fingers away.

“Wait, don’t. Don’t you want to- you know? Look at me with it on while we…?” Blood pumped through his veins hotly as she brushed herself against him, poised to initiate, giving him the briefest taste of her wetness on his hardness.

But she had consumed a recent column in Cosmo that said men liked it when you kept it on.

“I mean, yeah, um… I would," he told her honestly, swallowing at the image of her looking as sexy as she did as she rode him. "But you like it when I touch you.” A tender smile slid onto her lips. “When you know… I play with your…” He ran his fingers over the material covering her breasts. “I know you really like that.”

“I love you,” she told him, sincerely meaning it as she always did. “And I do like it when you touch me there, and you know...” she said blushing— should she really be blushing with her sexual partner over pretty common foreplay?— at him touching her and him noticing how she reacted to it. “Especially with your mouth. But it’s alright this time.” She leaned into his ear and told him softly, gathering up the nerve to be as forward as she was their first night together, “I want to fuck you just like this.” He nodded, barely able to form words. A part of him worried he would really have to go back to thinking about baseball this was so heady. She took his hand and moved it between her legs. “Now,” she said in a commanding tone that fired him up. “Touch me.” He slid his finger inside her and she bit her lip cutting off a slight groan. She was really wet, and he started to press his finger against her and move it the way that always got the biggest reaction from her. She had shown him in the past, moved her hand against his so that he knew how she liked it, how to touch her. She never had a problem telling him what she liked or taking what she wanted from him. It left a burning inside of him the way she did that.

What he really seemed to like though was her being in charge, and she quite liked that too.

She unabashedly moved against his fingers, enjoying his touch. He leaned in and started to nibble on her neck and ear as his other hand felt her up from her ass to her back and up to the nape of her neck. He was really turned on himself now and whispering all sorts of nonsensical and crazy things to her about how beautiful she was, how warm and soft she was, how he couldn’t believe she was his… all things that were quite pleasant for Veronica to hear until the pressure of desire started to build up inside of her. “JD…” she gasped. “I’m about to… oh my god. Harder… faster,” she breathed, gasping against him, unapologetically grinding herself on his fingers.

He did as she asked and she came with a breathless moan of ecstasy. 

As she came down from her orgasm with a bit of a laugh she turned her attention to his growing needs. He tried to angle her body to initiate but she stopped him. “Wait, wait.” 

“Please,” he begged. “I don’t know how much longer I can wait,” he told her, his voice straining. As much as she wanted to give him what he wanted she also had an idea. 

“Not much longer, I promise. It’s just- Do you still have those handcuffs I brought over on your birthday?” She asked, biting her lip wanting to play.

“Yeah, yeah I do.” He swallowed and took a moment to breathe before reaching over to the nightstand table and opening the drawer to produce them and the key as quickly as he could. “What, um, did you want to do with these?” He asked wide eyed as he stared at her, holding up the cuffs. She smiled slyly at him.

“I was hoping, maybe… you wouldn’t mind if I cuffed you to the bed frame?” She asked, quickly and nervously, suddenly and uncharacteristically shy. “I just- I mean- you can say no, but-” His wrists were already at the bed frame ready to be bound up at her request. He would never deny her anything she asked for but he really didn’t mind this request at all.

“Yeah, sure,” he told her quickly, not really believing what she was saying. Not that he should be surprised. This was after all the same girl who broke into his room one night and demanded he sleep with her. She stared back at him, with the handcuffs, trying not to be too excited at his agreeable nature to it all. “Whatever you want.”

“Really?” She asked, taking the cuffs and looping them around one of his wrists and then the other, effectively binding him to the bed frame. “This is okay?” She asked, again, making sure. “I don’t want to hurt you or-”

“This is completely okay,” he assured her. The blood was pumping through his veins as he tugged experimentally at the restraints holding him. After all, he hadn’t been fantasizing or dreaming about this since she left him at his place months back. Oh no, not at all. He breathed out trying to keep himself together.

_She’s even wearing something as sexy as I pictured she would be in my head, cuffed to the bed, with her on top of me._

“Excellent…” She bit her lip unsure what to do next. She liked the idea of him in this position but actually hadn’t really thought what to do with him exactly afterwards. Logistically at least.

“Um, Veronica?” He asked, getting anxious. “Are you going… to do anything?” He breathed out and they both glanced downward at the proof. "I'm really ready."

“Oh,” she told him startled. “Yeah, I guess… I can start, like this,” she told him as she pressed herself against him and began kissing his neck.

“Hmm,” he whispered as he anxiously tugged on his restraints. Normally his hands would be all over her when she was pressed against him like this but he enjoyed being completely at her mercy. She glanced down at him, and she slid her hand down and wrapped her fingers around him and gave him a tug. His head went back and a small strangled mewl escaped him. “God, that feels good,” he told her.

“Good,” she responded as she continued to do just that.

“Veronica,” he moaned when she stopped. “Fuck me. Don’t stop, please.” She ran her fingers over his face and carefully touched her thumb to his lip.

“Sh,” she told him. “I’m in charge, right?” He nodded. Her blood pumped, suddenly her whole body hummed being this much in control of their encounter. It wasn’t like she didn’t like it when he took the lead or when things were softer or gentler… this was just different and totally what she wanted at that moment. With a kind of deliberate care she carefully allowed herself to lower onto him, letting him feel just how wet she was before lifting herself up. He gasped as his eyes slanted, watching her intently as she slid down onto him. "Keep your eyes open. Watch me," she commanded. He did and watched her he did. He watched as her hands felt up and down his torso and up his arms.

She rode him as hard as she could and he watched her intently. He bit his lip and tried as hard as he could to make it last as long as he could but she felt good, way too good being completely at his mercy and his resolve was through. He let go with a deep grown that tore him apart nearly completely. It took a minute for both of them to recover and Veronica quickly brushed her hair out of her face, so terribly pleased with the braindead look on his face.

She reached for the key to the cuffs and unbound him and the moment he had his hands free they were pulling her face to his and burying themselves deep in her hair, pulling her as close to him as possible, kissing her and touching her the way he had been denied moments before. He released her and she rolled off of him, her own self spent. 

When he regained his ability to think he turned to her with furrowed brows. “Oh, I’m sorry you didn’t-” She hadn’t peaked during the actual intercourse. She appreciated he was at least apologetic about it whenever that did happen. "I just- I couldn't hold it in any-"

“Sh," she told him, pressing her finger to his lips. "It’s okay.” She sat up and began removing the corset. “Before was nice and I still really liked it.” She had liked seeing him come apart like that and was glad he did. "I liked being in control," she whispered softly, worried what he would think of that.

"I like you being in control," he offered back to her. She warmed at that and took off the corset off and breathed out. It hadn’t been terribly uncomfortable, but it was still a relief to get it off after wearing it for so long. She stretched comfortably next to him now.

“Are you all right?” He asked, concerned. “If it’s uncomfortable to wear things like that you don’t have to just because-” He reached his fingers out and touched her sides soothingly. She touched his hand, thanking him.

“I’m fine. I was just in it all night. It’s still nice to be out of it though. And I liked that you liked it so much.” She tossed it on the side as he grabbed his blanket. She snuggled against as he wrapped it around them. She rested her head comfortably on his chest.

A few minutes later things were quieter. They both drifted off to a quiet slumber meshed in each other's arms ready to wake up the next morning to drive off camping with their friends for the weekend.

* * *

The following night they found themselves alone in their tent. They had driven to some camping grounds with their friends and following some roasting of weenies, marshmallows, and all that they were alone in their own small tent for the night, everyone else having coupled up. "I keep thinking about last night," she admitted to him as they found themselves laying on their pile of sleeping bags, the blanket they'd brought snuggling them both for warmth. It wasn't terribly cold in the early summer, but with the sundown it made it comfortable for two to snuggle under the blankets. He sighed. 

"Same," he told her, with a smile. “It was good,” he told her. “Really good. It reminded me of our first time. That night was- God, one of the best nights of my life. Although yesterday is moving up the list.” She smiled, thinking back to the end of the September— so long ago, yet only eight months. Well, and a time travel escapade ago.

“That night was special. Really special. My first time. Not just with you but ever. I love how wonderful my first time was.” He grunted happily in agreement. It wasn’t that he had any particular fetish for a “virgin” or any warped ideas of female chastity but it had always made him feel special that she had come to him like that and that she was totally his. And like she had told him, he was totally hers in agreement. 

Veronica ran her fingers along his side warmly, snuggling her cold arm under his shirt. A question niggled the back of her skull, one she’d always been too shy to ask him both in fear he wouldn’t answer it, but also that he would. But they were committed to each other now, even moving to New York together in the fall, and it was a part of his past, and she wanted to know everything about him that he wanted to share with her. “Can I ask-? What was your first time like?” She asked him suddenly in the quiet of the cocoon of limbs and blankets they were in in their tent.

“What?” He responded, surprised at her question. It wasn't that he wanted to hide his past from her, he was just surprised she'd want to know.

“I know you weren’t a virgin that night. And I don’t know. I’m- I’m just kind of curious. What were they like?” She asked, knowing that if she didn't ask in this moment she might never have the courage to do so. And something in her knew she needed to know.

“Veronica, you don’t- It’s not-” He didn’t like the idea of talking about other girls with her. She was his girl, the only girl he had ever really loved and wanted, and he’d never been the type to talk about girls like “conquests” or empty vessels to stick one’s dick in like certain jocks at their school did.

And he was right, she didn’t but she did. He rolled onto his back and couldn't look at her.

“I’m not jealous,” she told him honestly. “I know you only have eyes for me. I just- I’m curious and am totally not judging you for it. If I had been with anyone else I would tell you whatever you wanted to know. It’s a part of your life experience and I… I would like to know.” He sighed.

“For real?” He asked, making sure. 

“For real,” she resolved. He swallowed and shifted their bodies so they were facing each other now. He took a lock of her soft hair and twirled it in his fingers. “How old were you?” Carefully he tucked the little tuft of hair behind her ear and indulged his fingers to run down her face. He took a deep breath before admitting to her the truth, in so much as he could tell it.

“I was fourteen,” he admitted.

“Fourteen?” she asked, catching herself surprised at how young he was. “That young?”

“I didn’t really have supervision,” he explained, suddenly aware of how young that really was.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to-" She shook her head, catching herself. "Go on."

“I guess- I mean- No one ever talked to me about that stuff other than when I got a more liberal school that had basic sex ed and they awkwardly made us put condoms on cucumbers. The year before in 8th grade they separated the boys from the girls and made us watch some film strips and read pamphlets from the 70s that weren't really helpful. God knows my dad never sat me down for some kind of man to man.” Veronica took that in, having been raised so differently from him. She may have been embarrassed by her mother’s insistence to have “the talk” with her at fourteen but suddenly she was glad she did. Particularly the most recent one they had when she took her to a gynecologist and had an exam. Her mom wated outside and she asked the doctor all her nitty gritty questions and she answered honestly, which was monstrously helpful to her in the sexual department of her and JD's relationship. But still, she remembered herself at fourteen. She and Martha were babies back then, still giggling at the idea of making out with a guy let alone sleeping with one. One time she had suggested a guy sticking his hand in her bra and Martha gasped and they worried her brothers or patents upstairs from their basement heard.

JD continued, frankly. “Hell, I probably got more information on sex from the porn I’d find in the woods than any responsible adult.” Porn found in the woods, Veronica nodded. It was a time honored and universal phenomenon. 

“No, I’m sorry. You’re totally right. Go on. Please, I want to know.” He sighed and bit the bullet to tell the story.

“I was fourteen and her name was Sunshine,” he admitted. “Sunshine…Evergreen Day in fact,” he told her partially embarrassed. “As in, yes, Sunshine E. Day.” He didn’t remember names that often but that one stuck out not just because she was his first. Veronica laughed and hit him.

“Oh stop it. You’re making this story up,” she chided. “I told you to tell me the truth!”

“I am,” he argued. “That was really her name! Look, we were living on the northern CA coast at the time and that honestly was one of the more normal names. There were seriously two Moonbeams in my freshman class alone.” Veronica laughed and he joined in, remembering the hippy community. She always forgot how many different places he really had lived. “She was nice, I guess. I mean at first.”

“At first?” She asked him, suddenly worried about the direction of the story. The idea of him with another girl was not a happy thing for her to think about in general, but she didn’t like the idea of someone hurting him even more so. 

“Let me tell it. Okay, so she came up to me on my first day of that school. It was my first high school in general. I had done six middle schools, and four elementary after we left Texas and already was bleary to the whole thing but it was my first day at any high school. These kids were a lot like Westerberg, they’d all known each other since kindergarten for the most part, but since it was the first day of a new school all around there were a few different new kids of sorts. I wasn't the only one.” He remembered. There were kids who went to other middle schools, hippy homeschooled types who managed to demand the high school experience, all that stuff. 

“Was she pretty?” She asked carefully, not wanting to sound petty but she couldn’t help it. He reached out and stroked her dark hair. _No other girl is as pretty as you_ , he wanted to tell her, but he didn't know if that would come off as too much even if it was his truth. 

“She was cute, I guess.” He shrugged awkwardly, not wanting to compare the two though. Sunshine— Sunny she went by— had long straight blond hair and wore a jean jacket with lots of pins on it, coupled with red high tops and jeans. But he honestly didn’t remember her too clearly looks-wise and probably couldn’t pick her out from a crowd now. After all, it being nine high schools ago. Besides, he had been a fourteen year old boy with little experience with girls beyond the girl he’d made out with in her basement at a makeout party in the 8th grade earlier that year and any female attention was still a novel concept for a guy who’d only just had his first round of puberty. And for the most part all girls were cute when you were just at the age when that stuff started to matter. Veronica was calmed by the look he gave her. It was tender. _You asked and he’s telling_ , she reminded herself. _And he’s yours. He adores you and worships the ground you walk on_. “It doesn't matter. Go on.” He proceeded with the story. He closed his eyes and conjured up the memory of California in 1986.

_They’d been in town for a week prior to school starting and he managed to get money from his dad for new clothes since he’d outgrown a lot of his recently........_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Before I get the questions: Finding porn in the woods is a thing pre-internet. It just was. Google it if you do not know of this and you can google such things on your browser.
> 
> 2) I will post chapter 2 probably tomorrow. But that felt like a natural break.
> 
> 3) Chapter 2 (now three chapters) of Love and Marriage will go up tonight
> 
> 4) Epilogue will COME NEXT TUESDAY. I SWEAR. But, like, seriously it is only a month away from the one year marker of me posting that and starting to really write! That's super cool.
> 
> Okay, comments, kudos, all beloved, all welcomed. TTFN!


	2. The Alex P. Keaton Effect

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! Part 2! This chapter turned out well if I do say so myself. The title refers to the main character of Family Ties-- Michael J Fox's character-- and the fact that his parents were liberal hippies so his form of rebellion was turning super Reagan lover conservative. I use it as a phrase in reference to teenagers who rebel when they have liberal parents in general. Basically, no matter who the folks are they will always find a way to do so.
> 
> Part 3 will be in a couple of days, Part 2 of Love and Marriage is on the docket next. Epilogue officially March 23. March 30 I will *try* to get a new chapter of Hot Rails for the people who do like it. I didn't mean to abandon it the way I did.
> 
> Queen's "Who Wants to Live Forever" gets a shout out off their Kind of Magic album along with "Pain Is So Close to Pleasure." No Highlander soundtrack was ever officially released at the time much to my surprise.

**California**

**1986**

They’d been in town for a week prior to school starting and JD had managed to get money from his dad for new clothes since he’d outgrown a lot of his recently. He had begun his growth spurt earlier that year and he was already pushing towards five foot six and showing no signs of stopping. The last few times he’d needed new clothes they had been in Texas visiting his grandma and she’d gone to Pennies and gotten him some generic things he wasn’t allowed to complain about, but at least they kind of fit. But when they had gone this last summer for the week her mind had begun to wander and none of his father’s other family thought to help the kid out before school started.

So at fourteen years old he did it himself, much like how he’d learned to go to the grocery store for food and boil water to make mac and cheese and microwave a jar of sauce and frozen meatballs if he wanted spaghetti. By himself. Through trial and error.

He was rather surprised his dad had even given him the money, though it wasn’t a lot. Maybe even he realized he was looking pretty ragged in jeans that were too short for him and shirts that didn’t cover him all up. Besides, having JD do it himself was easier than going to the department store and awkwardly doing it himself. Something that even if he'd been a single parent for nearly six years he had never done.

So, without anyone to tell him what to buy and where to do it he ended up at the California town's thrift stores near the wharf to get more bang for his buck than at Penny’s or Sears realizing he could use the leftover money to buy candy. He’d gotten all sorts of old band shirts, flannels, cheap jeans with holes in them, a new— albeit used— pair of cheap used motorcycle boots...

...And his coat. He’d fallen in love with that coat at first sight, hanging on the rack in a thrift store. It was a black duster that was kind of too big on him, but he had already begun to grow and figured he’d just get taller soon and that he might as well get a bigger one now rather than replace it later when he did. He couldn’t verbalize it, but somewhere in his mind he understood a coat like that could wrap around his body and make a physical barrier or shield to others. 

And he thought he looked cool wearing it. Which was honestly the most important thing to a fourteen year old boy.

So that’s how he looked when he walked into that high school on day one. Add to that the sullen quietness, the mysteriousness of a new face with no back story, and his natural habit of sitting alone in a corner with a book and he had no idea what a heady combination that could be to a teenage girl desperate for something different than the same five boys she’d known her whole life.

This particular girl in question noticed him pretty quickly in their homeroom as someone not from around there. She went up and talked to him during lunch. It was nice out and since it was CA they had an outdoor seat area for their lunches, with kids playing basketball or dicking around on skateboards in the open area. He was alone, near a tree balancing a book on his lap and eating Twizlers he was lucky to have tracked down at the grocery store. He was in Red Vines country now but he preferred the vastly superior Twizzler.

“You’re Jason, right?” He looked up from his book hearing his full name. “You’re in my homeroom.”

“Very astute,” he responded. “And if you had paid attention I corrected the teacher it was JD, not that I’m sure the guy listened.” He'd been going by "JD" since seventh grade. It was simpler, shorter, easier for people to remember and even easier for them to forget when he was gone.

"I'm Sunshine, but I go by Sunny," she told him. He looked at the blonde hair and the wispy frame of the fourteen year old girl in front of him.

"Sunshine?" He asked, with a laugh, even though he had already heard the roll call in class that day list the several students names with more... unusual names. "At least you didn't get stuck with Rainbow or something," he quipped.

"Um. That's my sister's name," she told him. He rolled his eyes. He had hoped this girl--  _ oh god, not one of those "be friendly to the new kid!" types-- _ would waltz off given his ‘tude but she didn’t. That intrigued him a little. Instead, to his surprise, she sat down next to him and pulled out her own lunch. A sandwich with sprouts sticking out of it and an apple. Not too many others were around the little side area though to notice. He pulled a Twizzler out of his bag.

“What are you eating?” She asked, aghast at his own lunch to his shock. He shrugged. He hadn’t been in the mood for what passed for lunch in the cafeteria that day and instead just grabbed the free milk and the candy he had left over from his grocery run yesterday. 

“What are you eating?” He countered at her sandwich which looked like the lawn was inside the brown bread.

She furrowed her brow. Everyone she knew ate like she did. “Avocado and sprouts sandwich with organic veganase spread my dad makes homemade," she explained. She opened the rest of her lunch bag and showed him. "With some granola, yogurt, fruit leather, and an apple from our tree in the backyard." He looked at her side eyed and held up the candy. JD was the epitome of the latch key kid of the 1980s and granola had never even entered his lexicon. 

“Twizzlers.” She stared at them wide-eyed.

“Wait. Candy? From a store? Like, made with real sugar? And artificial flavors?” She asked wide-eyed. He didn’t get her incredulousness. He’d eaten whatever he wanted ever since no one was around to tell him what to eat and what not to eat.

“Uh, yeah.” He looked at her blind lust at the bright red candy. “Um, do you want one?” He offered, unsure what else to say to the look on her face. She stared at him as if he'd just offered her pot. But given what she was revealing about her diet and the general vibe of the community he was in she might have been more comfortable had it been a simple stick of marijuana in his hand. She took the red licorice and stared at it. She’d never had candy that wasn’t from the health food market.

“My dad told me processed sugar is worse than cocaine and that’s what’s killing everyone. That and artificial colors and flavors.” JD rolled his eyes. He had realized this hippy community they were in was pretty wack kind of quickly. He’d also had to endure some rants from his father over the local environmental groups pissed he was tearing something or other down. He was hoping they’d move somewhere cooler next.

No matter what else in his life, he could always count on the next move. Another school to be “new” in.

“It’s just a Twizzler,” he told her plainly. He rooted around his bag. “I have some M&M’s too.” Her eyes widened even bigger as he offered her an M&M.

“I’ve never had real chocolate. We eat carob at home. My dad says carob is actually better than chocolate.” She took the candy and ate a few. She swallowed incredulously. “He’s a fucking liar.” JD snorted. He would soon learn these rants about her father would be common.

After that they hung out a couple of times. Sodas, pizza, stuff like that. All the stuff she was told was bad for her that he thought of as “normal” she wanted to do. With him. Well, he thought the "with him" part. The kissing had begun pretty quickly after they started doing that. She would initiate the making out and he didn’t object to the new regular occurrence. He was just in awe of the novelty of a girl who wanted to hang out with him in general. In return she was surprised and jealous by his freedom and he told her plainly that his dad didn’t care what he did. 

He could stay out however late he wanted, ate whatever he wanted, and never had to check in with his dad. She thought that was amazing. She disliked her dad a lot. They didn’t eat meat in the house, or processed sugar. Molasses was a cure all for everything. He was open-minded, to a point. Just because he gave a pro-sex talk and offered to get her a diaphragm when she wanted didn’t mean she didn’t have to be home by eight on a school night or check in all the time with him. And she really hated how much he told her it was for her own good all the time. He was also really obsessed with saving something or other near the wharf. Her older sister was another sore spot for her. A junior in their school she was always in her face and acting like she was her mother, not her sister. Or something. JD had a hard time following some of her rants. He did get that she was envious of JD’s supposed “freedom” and perceived “mature way of living.”

JD didn’t respond to any of this at first. They'd got to a wooded spot nearby to do it. He would just kiss her and be happy she wanted him to do that. He would walk her home but she’d always make him leave her a block away from the actual house. He should have realized that as the first clue something was up.

The second was that they didn’t really talk in school. Despite the hippy climate it all was pretty much the same as any other school district he’d been in. High school it appeared wasn’t terribly different from middle school and he’d learned pretty quick to stay clear of any of the older kids. He’d already gotten into a few fights in middle school and whilst he wasn’t afraid to fight back and could start handling himself, he never went out of his way to pick them. 

He had noticed there were the populars and the not-populars even if it wasn’t a sports-centric school. But just because the popular guys may not have been jocks— but guys with skateboards— it was still the same old stuff and they acted pretty much the same. And the popular girls were still the pretty ones. Sunny was as it appeared somewhere in the middle, though if she had wanted to she could probably be an object of desire to them. He had felt pretty good knowing she’d chosen to kiss him over the skater guys who were clearly in more demand. 

They had been hanging out-- and more importantly making out-- for about two weeks when the day finally happened. The day he lost his virginity to her. It had started out as a normal day. He went to school and they met up in the parking lot after school to figure out where they wanted to go to makeout that day. He had supplied illicit Twinkies for her to try for the first time and he was trying to get her to go to a movie with him.

As she was considering the option an old Volkswagen van pulled up and an older man in his thirties with Birkenstocks and long hair emerged, slamming the door behind him. JD noticed Sunny get tense the second it happened. “Sunshine Evergreen Day! What are you doing!?” She swallowed the fake bread and sugar and looked at the man guilty.

“Dad!” She exclaimed, surprised. “I-”

“And who is this? Is this who you’ve been sneaking off to meet? Did I not tell you to come home right after school today?!” JD started to back away. He had no idea what to do in a situation like this. In his world when a “dad” got mad he got abusive. Either physically or verbally. Mr. Day was not that kind of man though. He could lose his temper, yes, but he wasn't abusive.

“His name’s JD. He’s- he’s new here. A friend of mine,” she told her father, turning defiant, working past her initial reaction of guilt at being caught with a boy and eating food she was banned from. “Jason Dean,” she made sure to articulate his last name. The man finally turned his eye to JD, raking over him disapprovingly. “My boyfriend.” JD started at that, she had never called him her “boyfriend” before. He wasn’t sure how to feel about that. The idea that he had a "girlfriend."

“Dean?" He asked, shocked, recognizing the name. "New? Who’s your father?” JD was shocked he was being addressed and his father was being asked of. “He’s not that Dean as in Big Bud Dean Demolition trying to destroy the area near the wharf the seals hang out at? That Dean?” JD shrugged. He vaguely understood that was the job his dad was doing down there.

“Yeah, that’s my dad,” JD said, confused. "His company. And it sounds like him." He didn’t have a high opinion of the man either, but her father didn’t notice. 

“Seriously?" Mr. Day said to his daughter, ignoring JD again. "The boy of the trash that wants to destroy the seal refuge?” He seethed. “When your sister told me she thought you had some kind of boyfriend I thought she meant your friend River. I didn’t think you'd go out with a kid this this!” JD felt suddenly very low, even though he didn't think a man like her dad's opinion really mattered. Sunny took the moment for all it was worth. She put her chin out and her hands on her hips.

“What are you gonna do dad? Tell me to stop seeing him? Ground me? Lock me in my room? Police my body?” She said, very specifically understanding how to hit his parenting buttons. JD was at a loss. He had no idea what was really going on. A part of him thought it was cool that she was willing to piss off her dad to be with him but he was young and didn’t get that this had nothing to do with him. It had to do with her own issues with her dad and his rules and her home life.

Sunny stared at her dad and he realized what he was doing. He stopped himself because he knew how he sounded: like an authoritarian. The one thing he had always assumed he’d never be. Quickly he backed off.

“Fine. We’ll talk about this when you get home. By eight o'clock!” Her father glared at JD one more time making him feel like dirt that didn’t deserve to be anyone’s friend or boyfriend. Especially not his daughter’s. Even if he wanted to tell him he hated his dad far more then even he probably did.

He finally drove off. JD stared at her, unsure what she wanted to do. She huffed and then turned to him, remembering that he was there watching the whole thing. “God!” She yelled, frustrated. She kicked a rock and JD fixed his coat. “My dad’s such a prick! Come on, let’s go back to your house.” He didn’t know how to respond to that. But the idea of hanging out— and making out— with her was all he really cared about and if they went to his room the making out could happen. Normally his dad wasn’t home until after eight and he knew she’d be back to her house for dinner by then. He took her by the hand and led her to their rental house.

“This is your room?” She asked, looking around the plainly decorated room in the rental when he led her up there. She'd looked at the boxes and the emptiness of the house with alarm the second they got in the door. Nothing hung on the walls and the boxes were still packed in stacks. He shrugged and took his coat off and threw it on the floor.

“In this house it is.” She sat on his bed next to him and took her own jacket off, throwing it on the floor in a fit of rebellion like he did.

“No one’s really going to be home for a while?” She asked, both surprised and jealous. The house was insanely quiet compared to hers. She shared a room with her sister and never had privacy. 

“Just me and my dad,” he explained, not really wanting to get into it. “But, yeah, he’s home after eight usually from work and stuff.” _Unless_ _he’s at the bar_ , he didn’t add. She nodded, acting like she understood. He got up and opened one of his boxes rooting around for a tape to put on and pulled out his small portable tape player, hating the quiet suddenly. He put Queen’s _A Kind of Magic_ album on side two having really loved Highlander when he saw it over the summer and hit play. “Who Wants to Live Forever” blared on.

But it was "Pain Is So Close to Pleasure" that was playing when he lost his virginity. That detail he always remembered.

“Where’s your mom?” She asked, realizing she had never asked the obvious. She didn’t get that it was a sore topic she should really just drop. 

“She’s gone,” he said, quietly and not elaborating.

“Oh, yeah? Mine too,” she told him, not getting he meant dead and not just divorced. “She was living communally with us until the end of eighth grade. She took off though. Now she’s up on this farm near Sacramento ‘finding herself.’” She rolled her eyes at the idea. “She visits a bunch and we talk about once a week but, yeah. I get it. It really sucks.” JD sat down next to her.  _ I would love it if I could talk to my mom. Even if it’s just once a week _ , he remembered thinking to himself so intently. Instead of telling her that he leaned in and kissed her. She was cool with it. Really cool with it actually even when his body took control and he leaned her down on his bed and things progressed to the next few bases. “Wait, wait,” she told him as clothes were being discarded.

He thought she wasn’t comfortable and prepared himself to back off. Turns out, she was actually reaching into her book bag to get out the condoms she was carrying with her ever since they started making out. Her sister had given her them. Probably why she told her dad she thought she had a regular boyfriend. In fairness, she had been given “the talk” pretty early and bluntly and without any moralizing about “waiting” for “someone special.”

“Mom said lovemaking is a natural and positive method of improving one's sexual health as well as mental and physical,” she explained as he examined the box, figuring out if he had any reservations about it himself. “So, um… do you want to?” 

He didn’t know much about that, but he hadn’t been raised to overly moralize the whole experience either— mostly because it was never brought up either way— and was glad he didn’t have to waste his money buying the protection. His precious spending money he managed to get from his dad was for comic books, tapes, slushies, candy, and other frivolous things like groceries and toothpaste.

That being said, the actual act was very much a first time. He broke the first condom struggling to get it on correctly. It didn’t last very long and she expected him to be in complete control of the encounter though he was at a loss and did the best he could from the limited knowledge random books and porn found in the woods provided him. At least she didn’t critique it too harshly and she helped show him where exactly the parts went. He was never quite sure where his hands were supposed to go. 

Outside of the moment of kissing and touching it was awkward laying with her afterwards, given how fast it had all moved. Neither of them had done what they had just done because of any particular feelings for each other. Right as she was about to open her mouth to talk he heard the car pull up alerting him of an early arrival home. He sat up quickly and grabbed his underwear and pants. “Shit, you have to get out of here,” JD told her, grabbing her clothes and handing them to her. 

“What? Why?” She asked, putting her clothes on. She didn’t like being rushed out of bed barely dressed. She didn’t know what the big deal was. He’d said his dad wasn’t strict. Panic filled his lungs. He’d never had a girl over before and had no idea of knowing what his dad would do. In fact, he couldn’t remember the last time he had brought any kid home from school.

“Look, my dad’s home super early. It can’t be for a good reason. Just- I don’t want him to see us up here like this. Quick.” She finished getting her stuff on and grabbed her bag. He threw his coat on and gave her jean jacket. 

“Jason? Is that you upstairs?” His dad called. He could hear the pop tab of his Coors Light open with a hiss from his room and he winced. JD realized he left the tape on and quickly he turned it off.

“Out the window,” he whispered. “I’ll walk you home, promise.” They headed out that way. Luckily this was a one floor home and they could quickly run out the back way.

“But-?” He put his hand over her mouth as he heard his dad banging around the kitchen. 

“It was a shit day. Fucking hippy town,” he grumbled. “Save the wharf! Please. Just trying to do a job and feed my family." He started opening the cabinets. "Gosh dad, it's near dinner time," Bud said, imitating his son who was not answering him. "You buy those frozen meals that I like? Fuck. Just the box pasta again?” JD then heard the footsteps move closer to the room. “Just what did you do with all the money I gave you for groceries?" He asked in his normal tone. The one that could mean getting manhandled or belittled. "Jason?” Bud asked, pushing the door open without knocking. He saw the room was empty and grunted, thinking he’d heard something. JD didn’t realize it at that moment, but when Bud walked inside he found a box on the side table with the lamp next to his bed and stared at it curiously.

JD and Sunny managed to avoid his dad and were now on the sidewalk away from him before he had noticed there was a girl in his room and got… well, he really had no idea what the reaction would be. They walked in silence for a few minutes as they made his way to her house. He crossed his arms across his body and kicked some rocks as they walked the path back to her nice and by JD’s standard’s “normal” family’s house.

“That was weird,” she said finally, still fixing her clothes. “Why’d we have to leave like that? I thought you said your dad was cool.” She had meant it in regards to the no rules thing. It hadn’t occurred to her that no rules or supervision did not equate to being, “cool.”

“I said he didn’t care what I did, not that he was cool,” he spit out. The whole day had been weird. Meeting her father, losing his virginity, and having a heart attack at the idea of an outsider— his girlfriend?— seeing what kind of family life he had. He was only fourteen after all and that was a pretty big day. Doing it for the first time was supposed to be a big day, right?

Only, only he didn’t really like Sunny now that they’d consummated the relationship. She complained about her family. A lot. They barely talked other than that. She was cute, but he wasn’t attracted to her beyond that. There was no… click. No sympatico way they talked. She didn’t notice things like he did and when he tried to tell a joke she didn’t laugh. She wasn’t dumb and got okay grades but she didn’t have a light of intelligence to her. And, well, she wasn’t overly kind to others now that he thought about it. She’d complain about how outsiders made fun of the hippies in her town but he remembered one time hanging out the other day she was making fun of some tourists near the wharf and how preppy they were dressed. How “totally square” she’d called them mockingly when all they were doing was taking photos of the sea lions. She didn’t get that her making fun of them was no different than them making fun of her. 

They had the trappings of an alternative lifestyle around this part-- and regardless of Sunny’s rebellion-- she really was just like them. Change the jean jacket with buttons for a blazer and knee socks and she was just like the rest of them at the core.

And what really burned him now that it all came together for him was that she hadn’t once acknowledged him to her peer group or at school. Her argument with her dad. The purposeful way she brought up going all the way. He didn’t even know what kind of music she liked. Or movies.  And that thing with her dad. Who he was and how she told him who his dad was. It wasn’t like Sunny didn’t know. Sunny did know. Sunny knew all too well. He realized it then and there. She picked him as her first “boyfriend” for a very particular reason. As it turns out when you come from such a free love and hippy family it’s really hard to figure out how to rebel and piss your parents off. There’s no going to rock concerts, piercing a part of your body, getting a tattoo. JD— the son of a guy about to demolish something her dad cared a lot about— had been the best way to do it. 

He was nothing more than her personal fucking rebellion phase.

“Look, JD. It’s okay,” she told him softly, trying to relate to whatever it was that just happened with his dad. She touched his shoulder and he stared at it. They had been as physically intimate as two people could be less than an hour ago and now he didn’t even want her to touch him. “Trust me, I get it. My dad sucks too. My mom left us too.” 

“No Sunny. You don’t get it. My dad sucks, not yours,” he said bitterly, letting it out. She dropped her hand and stared back at him, shocked by his tone. He normally had been quiet with her, making weird comments on stuff but he had never been angry. He had never let it out to anyone and she was as good a target as any even if he felt lousy saying it to her after they had just done something he fairly understood to be an intimate act. He had no idea how angry he had been the last few weeks about her bitching over her dad. 

And certainly no idea how angry he’d always been. His anger inside of him was now bubbling a bit.

“Sunny, your dad gives a shit about you. Just because he makes you eat tofu and sprouts doesn’t make him an asshole. My dad gets home from work and drinks. Your dad cares about a building on the wharf and wildlife.” They were fourteen. Explaining the difference between honest to god neglect and simple teen parenting issues was difficult. “My mom didn’t ‘leave.’ She’s not off ‘finding herself.’ She’s not going to wander back into my life like she never left in a month or two. My mom’s dead, okay? Dead!” She started at the admission, like he just shot her. She hadn’t known any kids who’s mom’s were dead. Divorced, yes, but not dead. It hadn’t even occurred to her that that was the case with him. She just assumed it was some divorce scenario like her that made him quiet and a little moody, not… all this. “Five years ago I sat on a bench and watched as she walked into a building my dad was demolishing. He pushed the button with her inside! We’ve moved nine times since then. I have no one. No brothers, no sisters, no one around me. That’s what having a shitty home life is, Sunny. Okay?” He was breathing in and out at an alarming rate, no idea where the anger had come from. He had no idea why he was unloading on this poor girl. This perfectly normal girl who’s only real crime was that she was upset her mom and dad had split up and she had family trying too hard to compensate for it. She had a right to be upset over that. Life is not a tragedy Olympics.

So, yes, he _was_ being an ass, but he was too young and too angry to get that he was being an ass. He had no model for healthy male and female relationships. No knowledge of how to express the perfectly valid emotions tumbling inside his young adolescent brain.

“Well, you don’t have to yell at me about it! Or be mean to me!” She responded realizing she was out of her depth and had no idea how else to react to what was a huge amount of information laid at her feet. “It’s not my fault your life sucks!"

She hustled back to her house and he didn’t follow her. He went back to his own home and walked in through the front door. He imagined she probably got home and tearfully apologized to her dad, told him how she was really grateful that he was who he was and they hugged it out like they did on that “very special” episode of Growing Pains. JD, on the other hand,  walked back in the front door, taking his coat off and putting it on the chair in the kitchen dreading whatever interaction he was about to have with his dear old papa. His dad was in the living room with a case of beer next to him and the last box of mac and cheese in a bowl on a tv tray in front of him. On top of it all JD realized that was the last of the potentially hot food he bought the other day and He’d have to settle for a sandwich or whatever was left in the fridge.

“Where have you been?” Bud asked as he began rooting around the kitchen. JD was startled. He seldom asked him that. “I thought I heard you upstairs when I got home,” he asked curiously.

“Nowhere,” he responded. Bud didn’t press him to elaborate. JD started to shake. This was the longest conversation the two had had in a couple of weeks so far. JD found a jar of peanut butter and slathered it on the last two slices of bread— the ends, naturally— and opened the fridge to find a can of Coke inside. He didn’t even bother to get a plate out from the box of kitchen stuff sitting on the counter.

He should have gone up to his room with it and spent the rest of the night there brooding over what was his first sexual encounter and his first breakup all in one go, but it was Thursday and he wanted to watch Cheers and Night Court. He really liked Night Court. Bull was funny.

He sat down with his father and watched prime time TV-- The "family" hour-- with him. 

Family Ties was on. JD never liked that show much even though he watched it if it was on because they didn't have cable and there wasn't much else on on Thursday nights. It was one of those family sitcoms. It wasn’t like the really old boring ones from the 50s or 60s he’d see on reruns where the problems were laughably simple, but they still were resolved in thirty minutes. The family was four— with a cute baby just added since the younger daughter was getting older now— kids and their former hippy parents now living cushy suburban lives. The twist being the rebel teen boy was a Reaganite. But he was nice, don’t worry.  The plot this week was dumb and centered on Michael J Fox’s character since he was now the most popular actor on the show. Alex was going through girl troubles since his girlfriend Ellen from all of last season broke up with him off-screen— probably because the actress wasn’t contracted for another season— to go to dance school. They had also just randomly decided the baby brother was four now, like no one watching would notice, and that always bothered him when they did that.

He was sitting at the opposite end of the couch from his dad when a commercial hit. Bud held up the box of condoms with the leftover ones inside that he had found in his room after he and Sunny exited the window. He put them down on the coffee table in front of the TV. "Gee dad, I'm at a certain age and I have a lot of questions about sex I would like to ask you, you know, man to man," Bud told him as he settled back into his seat. JD froze, swallowing the last of his sandwich and putting his Coke down. 

His father rolled his eyes and reached for another beer. He popped it open. “Fuck. You know, you don’t have to be secretive about having a girl over.” He didn’t respond to his father. “It’s about time. That’s all.” He paused and looked darkly at him. “I mean, it _was_ a girl, wasn’t it?” He questioned his son. JD’s throat seized at his father’s intrusion into that part of his life and quickly he got up and went straight to his room. He could hear the quiet chuckle of his father all the way to his bed.

The next day at school he debated apologizing to Sunny if for no other reason than he felt lousy about yelling at her minutes after they had slept together. He walked into the area where the kids congregated before school to look for her even though they never spoke at that time of day. He was prepared to apologize. Well, until he spotted her sitting on the wall with some other girls where the boys liked to do their skateboarding tricks and show off to them. She was giggling and pointing at one of the boys that all the girls were into. JD didn't get what was happening and kept walking towards them. 

One of the boys-- River he'd find out later-- and kicked his board up and walked over to her. Sunny started smiling. River leaned over and Sunny leaned into him...

...and she kissed him lightly on the lips.

Something snapped inside of JD. He didn't even really like this girl. He didn't even really want to be her boyfriend. But given all that had just happened. The humiliation with his dad, the weirdness of his first time- he couldn't explain it. He still didn't get why he did it.

He marched up to the skater guy and slammed his fist into him. All the kids got up in shock. The boy landed on his ass on the ground and stared at JD, like he was crazy.  "The fuck, man?" The boy said, shocked and in pain. 

"That's my girlfriend!" JD snarled.

"What?" The boy said, checking his lip for the blood coming out of it. "She said she went out with you for, like, a second. Out of pity for you being new and having some dead mom sob story." JD seethed, as he realized she had told everyone the story he told her about his family. "She said she dumped you cuz you're mean! She's right!" JD kicked him when he was down and almost did it again when he heard a female voice cry:

"What are you doing? Get off of him!" He turned. It was Sunny staring at him like he was a monster. And he probably was. She rushed passed him and went to River on the ground.  "God, my sister and everyone were right! You really are just a psycho loser freak!"

JD shook, unsure what his next move was. _Leave. Run. Before a teacher comes out and yells. Before they call your dad about a fight._ Sunny picked the boy up and began to lead him away comforting him to the nurses office. Before she left she handed him to his friend and walked over to JD and hissed in his ear:

"I can't believe I slept with a freak like you! Don't talk to me again!" He stared back at her, wondering what he ever saw in her as she went back to her new boy. 

JD bolted, cutting school for the day. He walked as far as his legs could carry him-- nearly five miles out of town-- when he spotted the oasis he didn't think existed in this crunchy town: a 7/11. It was open, of course, and he went in and got a cherry Slurpee. He spent the rest of the day there refilling the cup with what little money he had, getting a hot dog for the microwave, and reading the magazines at the counter until a manager yelled at him that it "wasn't a library" and he left.

He ended up back at school the next day. He got stares, whispers. He was now a piranha at school rather than someone to just be ignored. He’d overheard several rumors the next week that she was seeing River now officially. She didn’t talk to JD or acknowledge him again. _Whatever_ , he thought. He was surprised by how little that actually bothered him, now that his other anger had subsided.

A part of JD wondered if she ever thought of him again— he hadn’t even asked if that had been her first time having sex too— but he knew that whatever they had had was not romance or love. It had been a mutual dislike of their family life and a first time doing a physical act that society put far too much weight and importance on losing or having and being "special." It was her cool dismissal of him the day after they had sex and she got a whiff of what his home life really was like that solidified any belief he had that she hadn’t any true feelings for him. 

It didn't have to last too long-- the humiliations of high school number one-- as two weeks later his dad told him to put his boxes in his van and they were going to Kansas. There was wheat there he vaguely understood. He didn’t even tell Sunny he was leaving. His last image of her was her and that skater guy that seemed to be really well liked with their arms around each other and her head on his shoulder. High school number two allowed him to put up a wall and start re-inventing who he was.

* * *

**Ohio**

**1990**

Veronica wasn't sure how to respond to all of that and took it in carefully, mulling the story over carefully in her mind. She nodded, appreciating his truthfulness in a whole. He’d looked away from her, feeling a bit ashamed over the whole fiasco. She reached out and started to smooth some of his dark hair away from his face. “Hey, thank you for telling me all of that. I asked after all. And you’re not that angry kid anymore. I mean, yeah, you were a dick to her,” Veronica said, honestly, once the initial weirdness of finding out about him with another girl was over. The whole story had been kind of sad, rather than anything to stress over. Another example in a long line of his own shitty home life and how awful teens could be with each other. “But she was a dick to you too.” JD shrugged. “You both had your issues. Struggle isn’t a contest. Her problems were real yours were just…” She struggled for how to phrase it. “Different? Harder? I don’t know."

“I guess,” he said, unsure himself. “I feel bad about it now that I say it all out loud to you. You must think I'm a real piece of shit." 

"You were fourteen. I did shitty stuff before I met you, you don't hold it over my head," she countered. "Look at my time as a bestie with Heather, Heather, and Heather. The pranks I helped with."

"That was never who you really were," he told her adamantly.

"And that angry kid wasn't really you," she said just as adamant. "That's because you're a better person now than when you were fourteen. You've found someone with professional experience to talk to. You got out of your dad's. You get that your angry can't destroy you or those around you." He sighed, thinking.

"And I met you," he told her, simply. He touched her hair. "I knew from the moment I met you you were special. Different. You were smart, you were compassionate, and you laughed at the same things I thought were funny. I knew that I wanted you as a whole." Veronica smiled. "Not just because I was looking for someone to make out with or sleep with or call 'girlfriend.'" He turned to her, concerned. "You get that, right? It wasn't just because-"

"I know. Don't worry. I felt it too," she assured him. "And I know you're not that kid anymore." She touched her head against his. "And like I said, I'm glad you told me. It's another piece of the JD puzzle for me to put together." He laughed lightly. “Wait. You said there were two,” she prodded. “Who was… I mean- was this next girl different? Did, you, um, like her?" She asked, tentatively. Veronica knew, knew, she had no right or reasonable expectation to think she was the only girl ever to turn his head but still.

“At first,” he admitted honestly and with a groan. “Caitlyn. Her name was Caitlyn. It was last year. When we were in Boston. That was a mistake. And a disaster in it's own right.” Veronica sat up on her elbow to listen.

* * *

_Caitlyn had red hair and wore a leather motorcycle coat and thigh high boots. She wanted to look like a girl in a heavy metal music video, that much was clear. She had a very high opinion of herself and was under the impression that everyone-- boys and girls-- all wanted her hotness. They all wanted her for either a friend or a fuck and she loved it._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A) I actually like Family Ties. It's a comforting 80s sitcom to watch. No shade meant on it.  
> B) I hope this felt real? It's what I was going for.  
> C) I've had phases of my life where I dressed like Sunny and Caitlyn, so no shade on clothing appearances intended  
> D) And no shade on vegan/healthy food choices-- more of a commentary on the 80s disdain for them. Especially 80s food trends. If you've never encountered some rando telling you carob tastes better than chocolate count yourself lucky. That was a very particular type of person. Gross. So glad it went out of health food fad.
> 
> Questions, comments, kudos-- all loved, all appreciated!


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